Isaiah13

¹The pronouncement concerning Babylon which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw:

²Lift up a flag on the bare hill, Raise your voice to them, Wave the hand that they may enter the doors of the nobles.

³I have commanded My consecrated ones, I have also called for My warriors Who boast in My eminence, To execute My anger.

⁴A sound of a roar on the mountains, Like that of many people! A sound of an uproar of kingdoms, Of nations gathered together! The Lord of armies is mustering the army for battle.

⁵They are coming from a distant country, From the farthest horizons, The Lord and the weapons of His indignation, To destroy the whole land.

⁶Wail, for the day of the Lord is near! It will come as destruction from the Almighty.

⁷Therefore all hands will fall limp, And every human heart will melt.

⁸They will be terrified, Pains and anguish will take hold of them; They will writhe like a woman in labor, They will look at one another in astonishment, Their faces aflame.

⁹Behold, the day of the Lord is coming, Cruel, with fury and burning anger, To make the land a desolation; And He will exterminate its sinners from it.

¹⁰For the stars of heaven and their constellations Will not flash their light; The sun will be dark when it rises And the moon will not shed its light.

¹¹So I will punish the world for its evil And the wicked for their wrongdoing; I will also put an end to the audacity of the proud And humiliate the arrogance of the tyrants.

¹²I will make mortal man scarcer than pure gold And mankind than the gold of Ophir.

¹³Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, And the earth will be shaken from its place At the fury of the Lord of armies In the day of His burning anger.

¹⁴And it will be that, like a hunted gazelle, Or like sheep with no one to gather them, Each of them will turn to his own people, And each of them will flee to his own land.

¹⁵Anyone who is found will be thrust through, And anyone who is captured will fall by the sword.

¹⁶Their little ones also will be dashed to pieces Before their eyes; Their houses will be plundered And their wives raped.

¹⁷Behold, I am going to stir up the Medes against them, Who will not value silver or take pleasure in gold.

¹⁸And their bows will mow down the young men, They will not even have compassion on the fruit of the womb, Nor will their eye pity children.

¹⁹And Babylon, the beauty of kingdoms, the glory of the Chaldeans’ pride, Will be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.

²⁰It will never be inhabited or lived in from generation to generation; Nor will the Arab pitch his tent there, Nor will shepherds allow their flocks to lie down there.

²¹But desert creatures will lie down there, And their houses will be full of owls; Ostriches also will live there, and shaggy goats will frolic there.

²²Hyenas will howl in their fortified towers And jackals in their luxurious palaces. Her fateful time also will soon come, And her days will not be prolonged.